An illustrative case study FIDIC’s standard forms of contract are widely used by parties of different nationalities as a contractual benchmark for the implementation of large scale construction projects worldwide. A special feature of FIDIC forms of contract is its built-in dispute resolution process through adjudication by a Dispute Adjudication Board (DAB). One of the…

On July 12, 2017, the Colombian Supreme Court issued a decision on the enforcement of the arbitral award rendered in the ICC case (No. 16088/JFR/CA) Tampico Beverages Inc. v. Productos Naturales de la Sabana S.A. Alquería, seated in Santiago de Chile. The decision provides for an interesting differentiation of the standard of review to be…

When ABBA launched “The Winner Takes It All” in 1980, modern arbitration was still in its infancy. The ICC case numbers were just about to become four-digit, while the cases administered by ICSID could still be counted on two hands. Yet already at that time, “The Winner Takes It All” exemplified one of the two…

The 1947 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) is often portrayed as one of the longest lived provisionally applied international treaties. The GATT was signed in October 1947 as a temporary/“stopgap measure” that would later operate under the auspices of the International Trade Organization (ITO), the third pillar of the Bretton Woods system (with…

The long-standing tax dispute between India and the Vodafone, also previously discussed in here, recently entered new territory when India secured an ex-parte ad-interim injunction restraining the continuation of one of two bilateral investment treaty (“BIT”) arbitration proceedings initiated against it by the Vodafone group. A judge of the Delhi High Court granted this injunction on…

The 29th Annual Workshop of the Institute for Transnational Arbitration (“ITA”), which took place on 14-15 June 2017 in Dallas, focused on a timely subject of much importance to the future of international arbitration, namely, the “Challenges to the Legitimacy of International Arbitration.” The event was co-chaired by Caline Mouawad (King & Spalding), Jeremy K….

In a 172-page judgment, the Singapore High Court in Kingdom of Lesotho v Swissbourgh Diamond Mines (Pty) Limited [2017] SGHC 195 (Lesotho), set aside an investor-state arbitration award rendered against Lesotho after an extensive review of international investment jurisprudence. This is the second investor-state matter that has confronted the Singapore courts following Sanum Investments Ltd…

The HKIAC Rules Revision Committee (the “Committee”) is considering amendments to the current version of the HKIAC’s Administered Arbitration Rules, which came into force on 1 November 2013 (the “2013 Rules”). The 2013 Rules, while maintaining the “light touch” approach of the 2008 Administrated Arbitration Rules, made important contributions to international arbitration by introducing unprecedented…

India’s dispute with Vodafone has been one of its most publicized and long pending disputes with a foreign investor. Despite attempts at conciliation, parties remain locked in international arbitration under the relevant BIT. It may not be hyperbole to suggest that India’s approach to this dispute effectively defines its attitude to investor protection, at least…

Reliance on the investor-state dispute resolution (ISDS) mechanism of the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT) is booming, with at least ten new cases registered in the past year alone. Notably, nine of these ten cases – and almost 60% of all publicly reported cases initiated to date – have been brought by an investor from a…

The decision of the Indian Supreme Court in A. Ayyasamy v. A. Paramasivam (‘Ayyasamy’) [(2016) 10 SCC 386] has been previously discussed on this blog here, and here. This post seeks to analyse the distinction between arbitrability of fraud concerning India-seated arbitrations and foreign-seated arbitrations created as a result of this judgment. The court in World…

As mentioned in Part I, a two-day conference on “Equal Access to Information & Justice, Online Dispute Resolution”, organised by the ICC took place in Paris on 12-13 June. Over 160 lawyers, magistrates, academics, researchers, dispute resolution organisations and online dispute resolution providers, from over 30 countries and representing each continent attended. The first panel…

A two-day conference on “Equal Access to Information & Justice, Online Dispute Resolution”, organised by the ICC took place in Paris on 12-13 June. Over 160 lawyers, magistrates, academics, researchers, dispute resolution organisations and online dispute resolution providers, from over 30 countries and representing each continent attended. The conference was jointly chaired by Ethan Katsh…

Professor Roger Alford, the Editor of Kluwer Arbitration Blog, was appointed to leadership role at the U.S. Department of Justice, where he will promote the enforcement of antitrust laws around the world. Professor Alford will be the deputy assistant attorney general for international affairs in the DOJ’s Antitrust Division, in which capacity he will manage…

Since 30 years, international arbitration of business disputes continues to increase. It has become the primary form, some say “the natural way”, of settling commercial disputes between companies or individuals from different countries. As international arbitration becomes more popular and wide-spread it has also become more sophisticated, developing its own procedures and documents. The steady…

Introduction It has been almost seven years since the introduction of the concept of emergency arbitrator procedure by major arbitral institutions, and the procedure has become an invaluable option for arbitration users who seek protection and preservation of their rights before the constitution of a full tribunal. However, most arbitral institution rules that include rules…

A recent ruling of the DIFC Court of First Instance (see Claim No. ARB 003/2017 – Pearl Petroleum Company Limited & Others v. The Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq [2017] DIFC ARB 003) deals with the question as to whether a State immunity defence may be available to a State entity or a governmental defendant…

August offered an eclectic mix of posts ranging from recent developments regarding mediation in investor-state disputes, the potential offered by mediation in environmental disputes in India, and the meaning of true voluntariness in mediation. Below is a brief summary of each of the posts published on the Kluwer Mediation Blog last month. In Where Might…

As on May 1, 2017, 60751 cases were pending in the Indian Supreme Court. Likewise, as per the data available, a total of 41,53,957 cases are pending in the twenty-four High Courts in India. The rate at which these cases are disposed, for various reasons like the vacancies for the position of judges, inefficient procedures,…

As the Co-Chairs of the ICCA-Queen Mary Task Force on Third-Party Funding in International Arbitration (Task Force), we are pleased to announce that the draft report of the ICCA-Queen Mary Task Force on Third-Party Funding in International Arbitration is now available for public comment until 31 October 2017. The draft report is available here. Overview…

(a.k.a why is it always Bill?) To those unfamiliar with this popular Hasbro™ family game, each team has a board with 24 faces on it – the faces vary in colour, shape, gender, facial hair and attire. In the conventional game each side ‘picks their person’ and the other player has to whittle down the…

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent those of Luther Rechtsanwaltsgesellschaft. Third-Party Funding (TPF) has certainly captured the attention of the arbitration community in the last few years. This has led to an interesting debate on its implications and potential need for regulation that has, however, failed…

The primary purpose of an arbitration clause is to represent the parties’ common agreement to resolve disputes arising out of their contractual relationship by arbitration. One-way arbitration clauses, however, serve this primary purpose while giving only one party the right to commence arbitration proceedings. Consequently, the other party only has the option of approaching a…